skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
As mentioned elsewhere in this thread, I think spotify have positioned themselves exactly to be in this situation. If they earn more money, the music labels still have all the negotiating power and will just take it, and if they raise their prices, less subscribers.

At a guess, I think spotify are trying to squeeze themselves into a position where the labels need spotify because otherwise artists just will not have the same reach otherwise, I know I dont listen to a band until they put their stuff on spotify. I have seen labels + bands be more reactive to making sure their stuff hits spotify quickly which seems to show a shift in power, hopefully the trend continues.
So quantum cryptography is over I guess.
I think the relative poor sales of Nexus devices proves that a fortune isn't really a guarantee if a company ensured updates. The amount of people who care about updates aren't enough to keep a business profitable.
I found much "meaning and passion" in programming after getting into it for the money. Conversely, I know a few people who started programming as kids, and who spent some time fighting depression, unable to feel the same passion as in their early years while doing real-world, bill-paying stuff. Typically, they try a few other things, and then get over it, realizing how lucky they are, sitting on the gold mine that is programming ability.

A life full of "meaning and passion" is typically sustained through money. It's much easier to find meaning and passion given money than it is to find money given meaning and passion. If nobody is willing to pay for your program, maybe it's not worth the passion; if they pay, maybe it is.
Well Apple's content (iTunes, App Store) exists mostly to move their hardware.

Compared to Amazon where the hardware exists to give users access to content.

Explains some of the price differences between the devices.
I'm personally getting a little tired of this. It seems to me that every 2 months for the last few years I've seen a new article titled "voyager has left the solar system". Perhaps I'm just ignorant but I can't help but think to myself "what... Again? " each time I hear it.
We've always been social creatures and when we came out of the trees did we really have anonymity and privacy? Village life has been the norm for most of your history and I believe that anonymity and privacy aren't the norm in village life. Am I wrong?

It seems to me that only since mass urbanization has there been anonymity and privacy and we begin to revert back to the historical mean. Although at a much grander scale. Is it the scale that is the danger? In the past one could leave the village for another location (in theory) and get away from stigma. Maybe now it is much harder.

Of course now there is much more information and many more instances of instant fame. Perhaps the noise will be anonymize us except to the powers that be.
The easy answer to this is to raise prices. We need to raise the price of digital goods if we want to move forward as a post-industrial society. I pay $36 a year for Pandora, I would pay $72. $3 a month is an insanely good deal. Before Napster I would easily spend $30 a month on music. Society needs more money in artists hands, because the robots are coming to take away more jobs, and we can offset some of that by reducing the labor supply by allowing more people to earn a living creating digital goods.

Many of you will say that most aren't good enough to be pro artists. I say that so many more would become good enough through deliberate practice if financial viability wasn't nigh impossible.

Capitalism as we know it will not survive zero-priced digital goods, robotics and other forms of automation. Deflation is a specter over all our heads.

Wise nations will look for ways to reduce the supply of labor, instead of an insane push for ever higher employment levels.
Sure, but regular folk don't seem to be up in arms over the lack of updates.
The point is you don't need to disrupt that culture. That culture is in fact what would permit the idea to work. There are badly paid good programmers already in China and elsewhere.

If you can manage to produce quality work and convince people to hire you consistently (big if, I know) in the high paying market, you can leverage the existing programming population oferring wages a lot higher.
Simple and useful. Don't forget to make the following manifest to everybody within your heroku wiki section:

a] before running $git push heroku master

Add a Procfile in root, whose content is simply:

web: node web.js

b] after running $git push heroku master

$heroku ps:scale web=1

That makes it!
I'm going to have to disagree with the idea that anonymity and privacy are innate qualities that we've had as humans since we came out of the trees.

I think those are actually innate qualities of civilization not of the human species in general. If you think about it, the savage more or less lived his whole life in the "public eye" of his tribe/village. It was civilization that finally afforded him some privacy.

And that's what I find so troubling about the panopticon society. It somehow feels extremely uncivilized. To the point of savagery.
Simple, they make dreadful, shitty shovelware. Failure is hardly surprising in that case.
Glad to hear. It certainly won't replace more comprehensive testing, but its good for a quick-and-dirty look.
'So much'? You honestly think an artist/label getting $0.003 per play is 'so much'? What world do you live on. At least with iTunes if say 1000 fans your track, you'll get at least $500 from the sales. But if those same 1000 just streamed the track from Spotify, they'd each have to play the track 166 times to get the same royalties.
The sooner Spotify shuts down, the better.
Just fyi, this is using MonoDB.
I think CS education is extremely effective, if one does the exercises himself, and as to software engineering, they don't teach about snake oil, either.

It's just that there's not that much to learn that is universally applicable, comparatively. The field is young, and then computers are easier to make sense of than most things, because we made them that way. Doctors need to deal with human bodies which aren't designed for human understanding and tinkering. Lawyers need to deal with documents which aren't designed for easy understanding, either - they're designed to prevent hostile, malicious parties from screwing each other. We simply have it easier than most skilled professionals.
The Changing Fabric of English
Love the website design also. The site design is simple but gives you all the info you need to make a decision.
Buy a google device (galaxy nexus), simple
ADB and Ghostery.

Sooner or later they should pass laws to protect the browser which is becoming the most dangerous thing there is.
Not a fan of the service or something else?
I think one of the problems with software engineering is that [almost] no one knows anything about it.

I've been a working programmer [or software engineer if I've just met you at a party and I think you're cute] for long enough to work on >5 multi-billion dollar projects. Of these, one was delivered on time and according to spec. That company went down the toilet within four years.

I've read fairly widely in the software engineering literature starting with Weinberg and Brooks in university, and chasing my share of papers, 'blogs and web pages since then. One of the most positive things that has happened to the field is the recent discovery that the only thing at the end of the methodology rainbow would appear to be consultants [wearing suits with slits for the dorsal fins [h.t. Mr Stross]] and stacks of unread Learn Florble-Oriented Development in 21 days.

I know I can build complex systems. I know I can sometimes build simple systems [much much harder.] I don't know how to reliably schedule a project to build a new thing. I think anyone who thinks they do know this is delusional or lying.

And in the end, I think it probably doesn't matter. The truth of the software engineering crisis, is that it never existed. And it's possible that software engineering never existed either. We program. We do it because we like it and it pays. The folks who do it only because it pays usually end up in management fucking things up by assuming they can motivate people always and only with money.

[oh, on a tangent I've also been a manager. I wasn't all that good at it. The team I managed delivered good stuff, some of it on schedule, but the company still went belly-up. And I learned that I don't enjoy management, and would rather have less money and more fun - take from that what you will]
I like to think of myself as master of the intelligent networked machines :)
There was a post here on HN not too long ago about exactly this. Drug cartels using ultralight drones to smuggle drugs across borders.

Found it: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4415508
What exactly does "ultimate responsibility" even mean here?
I hate to say it but that might be the right solution. They sold phones under false pretenses, so it would be reasonable to attempt restitution for that.
Don't get me wrong - I'm rather paranoid, and I'm not sure at all that this will last. All I'm saying is, the alternatives I know about aren't necessarily better, and if one talks about quitting the field because it's not enjoyable (without mentioning money), then my question - from an angle not unlike yours, I think - my question is, so what's your alternative way to make money.
I would suggest people not in the netherlands not click that link as it sets your language preference and you need to go searching for the language switcher :P
Or now nearly the year 2013 a grandfather has to convince his grandson "Yes we sent men to the moon, they walked on it." grandson "Wow awesome!"
Moves by SiriusXM Force Rogue Amoeba to Retire Pulsar
Here's my version: http://cocoflunchy.github.com/factorviewer/
Not perfect at all... but it works.
Meanwhile, my iPad 1 will never get iOS 6, even though they were top-of-the-line just 14 months prior to its announcement.
Google's New Virtual Brain Technology
Right now, the only sane expectation to have with most android phones is that the version of Android you buy it with is what you get (unless you are able/willing to install your own mod). That's definitely a downside compared to iOS, but most Android phones are a lot cheaper, which helps compensate for it.
What keeps me from Android is...

- The whole fragmentation and apps being made for iPhone first and sometimes never even making it to Android

- There is no Android store to take my device for a quick free fix or free replacement (Apple has replaced many of my idevices at no cost and done so quickly)

- A new Android device is released weekly; many cheap inexpensive ones. It just doesn't feel sexy/special to me as there is one iPhone millions lust for and the press and consumers go ape nuts over.

- The carriers and device manufacturers have a stranglehold on Android. Many Android users are not able to update their 2010 or 2011 Android device to 2012/2013 software as you can choose to do so with the iPhone. Also the device manufacturers create they own UI and add bells whistles. Android does not have one UI/UX to rule them all like iPhone.

With that being said as a long time iPhone owner .. I am annoyed by....

- Apple's tight control on it's ecosystem .. it indeed stifles innovation. I wish they would allow developers to build onto the built in apps (plug ins) like the camera, maps, alarm clock, facetime and other built in apps.

- New Maps definitely a step down from Google Maps

Overall I just wish there was only one Android device in which the UI/UX is controlled by Google. That would solve my Android complaints, but Google's M.O. is to be on as many devices as possible and thus Android doesn't work for me.
Amazon Kindle Paperwhite Jailbroken
Is high burn rate really a good idea for a company like Spotify? They have been around since 2006. Not exactly in the heart of pizza-consuming startupland any longer. If they aren't able to be profitable now, they have a big problem.
Submitted by an undisclosed Ziff Davis (owner of Geek, ExtremeTech and PCMag) employee/spammer.
As soon as I saw the Parrot AR Drone I imagined putting a small stripped down pellet gun on it.

I bet AR Drone will mysteriously become illegal soon.
Many people spend years or decades moving from job to job and from career to career looking for happiness. Most of them don't find it until they learn that your job just isn't what makes you happy. "Do something you love" is a myth.

Jobs are jobs because they involve a lot of crap people don't want to do. No one's going to find personal meaning by writing specs, or by cutting a beautiful design down to an ugly minimum to fit into time constraints, or by maintaining some poorly-written internal tool. But these are all things programmers will do, at some of the best jobs in the industry. Every job has a large chunk of "this sucks" work. If it's kept to a minimum, you're doing far better than most people.
Good post. I've been doing this for many years now though and I've been burnt out after maybe the first 4-5 on coding, but that is still what I do. It really is about the money though. Early on I had the idea that I would become an architect get all of the certifications (back when that meant something), work my way up management and have a house at the beach, at the lake, and in the mountains. Ha. Yeah, I should have known. Right now I'm hoping that telecommuting becomes the norm. I love working from home, but I don't think I could make what I'm making now as a contractor doing Rails development, which is now primarily what I do. As long as I continue to be employed, I guess that is the main thing. And I guess that is the point of the post.
A Master of Improv, Writing Twitter’s Script
Serious Attackers Paired With Online Mob In Bank Attacks
Edit: Ignore me. I misread the parent comment.

"I've done the math before, and this post is wrong" isn't very compelling when the post in question shows the math behind its conclusion. What would be most compelling would be to point out the flaw in the post's math, and also to show us your own approach.
He may have learned things from going, but I didn't learn much from reading the post because it contained few specifics. Oracle is spending lots of money on Java? OK... on what? Etc.
Can you support the $0.003 figure? I've seen widely different figures in a few faces.
Two years would be plenty, most contract lengths in the UK are for 18 months or two years, people expect to be getting a new phone that is up.
There's really no reason for this to happen with so many excellent community roms. Open source is a give and take. Motorola and others could most likely keep their promises if they started with a community rom and focused on QA.

Also, Android needs a better method of updating the os that is more in line with how apple allows updates through iTunes.
Gold mining companies are accountable to reality: they can't extract gold that isn't there. Nor can they extract gold that isn't profitable to get at given the technological context. Money is supposed to be a representation of wealth, and private banking does that perfectly.

In contrast, government banks are "accountable" only to the whims of politicians and a public that wants its cake ("reasonable" taxes) and to eat it too (immoral entitlement programs). That's one purpose that statist banking serves: to make up for the inherent, recurring government budget shortfall by printing boatloads of money, forcibly lowering the standard of living of anyone that saves, in order to "benefit" those that won't or can't.
> Fundamentally, Zynga's business model and products did not line up with the interests of either its host platform (Facebook) or its end users.

You left out: But it did line up with the interests of the investors, who then poisoned the well by bringing this POS public.
What do you think of "Geek Day" plan hatched on #Internet2012 Campaign Bus Tour?
Sorry I'm a bit curious, but what are the dozen other networked technology devices that are much more worrying?
Technically, it already is for outdoor use in the UK, unless the person flying it is not the person looking at the first person view, as the pilot has to keep visual contact with the aircraft. Also if you use one for anything commercial you are required to hold a civil pilots licence.

http://www.buzzflyer.co.uk/aerial-photo-uav-fpv-law.asp
Just don't forget that -16 mag will happen VERY close to the sun. Comet won't be visible from Earth at that time even at that magnitude, while it will be a cool sight for SOHO cameras, possibly blinding the sensor.
I don't think hack-shaming accomplishes anything.

Just yesterday we had someone publish a "securely delete your email" application. 'tptacek found problems in it immediately[1], but he didn't call the guy incompetent or an idiot or "never trust anything he does again." There was no attempt to shame.

I see the more experienced people around here have a lot more sympathy for these guys. If you've done a lot, you've also had some public mistakes. You grow empathy.

I do find the company's follow-up offensive. Hopefully they will learn from that, as well.

[1]http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4614474
In May, Google announced the expansion of the Nexus branding to multiple OEM partners simultaneously.

LG has recently shown off a Nexus phone, and one can expect more such announcements.

Nexus now resembles Microsoft's "Signature" branding for craplet-free PCs. All reasonably recent Nexus devices get upgrades directly from Google, much like iOS devices.

Also, not all OEM extensions are evil. Samsung's mobile device management extensions can be very useful in some use cases. If only we could get such extensions a la carte.
This post talks about the "App Store profit" not "iPhone-related profit", though. So it could very well be that out of 30% they ask for only half of that is pure profit, while that 15% translates to only about 1% of an iPhone's profit.
The key personalities to brainstorming
Actually, he was saying "I've done the math before, and the results are actually even more skewed than the post suggests".

So you can take the post as right on the basis of the math in there, or even -more- right on the basis of saurik's calculations.

I think "The talk was recorded, and I believe has been posted in various places" was basically "you can find a citation if you look but I don't have one handy, sorry", which is fair enough for a brief HN comment; I, at least, still find the data point somewhat useful.
Darpa shows off unmanned aircraft in-flight refueling technology
I think the pricing scheme is way too clumsy. The Amon and Amon Plus seem to map to two different kinds of web apps: hobby, and mission critical. There's a huge gap between the two plans. You're basically ignoring the users between the two levels by insisting that anyone who needs more than basic service get the super deluxe model.

The pricing scheme drastically needs a change. The free level is fine, but there needs to be at least onepaid intermediate levels: 2 apps, with features between free and plus. Why? If a developer is doing 1 hobby web app and wants to take it to the next level, a 2-app plan will both provide support for their current app and allow breathing room in case they want to go for a second.

As a web app developer myself, I would not pay for the Amon Plus plan. I have 1 web app running on AppFog. I don't need to pay for unlimited servers and unlimited apps. I would pay for basic support, but paid basic support is not available in the two tiers offered.
Grooveshark is profitable, even with having to spend most of their money on lawyers and being shut out of mobile devices for so long. If they had backed down they'd be dead, I think that's the takeaway.
Conversely, I hardly listen to music and bought maybe 10 CDs in my entire life. Spotify changed my behavior dramatically. I consume a lot more music now, that I wouldn't have otherwise. Spotify has got more money out of me than the sum of all my other music related spending. It's very possible I am an outlier though.
Sorry, that's not what I meant. I meant that the record companies ask for enough money that the company can stay in business but so much that they make a big profit.

Personally I think the amount artists get paid by streaming services is wrong. $0.003 and even less per stream is what I've seen but we also must remember that artists signed to the major labels get paid a much higher cut due to deals they make with the streaming services. I think the services would work best if artists/labels could opt-in and the price per stream was fixed for all artists ($0.02 per play seems fair to me).
The mission's web site: http://www.redbullstratos.com/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Felix_Baumgartner

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Kittinger
I don't think the public has anything to do with Zynga's failure. They've been losing mindshare and players since well before the IPO, and Facebook likewise has been closing the door on spammy app behavior since well before the IPO as well.

Zynga's failure is entirely its own doing.
Very few apps do make $8,700 (but those that do, often make far more)

is that true? i would have thought it's a power law. in which case it would be more correct to say "Very few apps do make $8,700 (and of those that do, few make far more)" since with a power law distribution, no matter what level you pick, the extremes are still extremes (if you see what i mean - the 1% have their own 1% who are the crazy rich part of the crazy rich...)

so does anyone have any numbers?

[it strikes me that, depressingly, you could summarize this as: no matter how good you are, getting an order of magnitude better is still hard.]
Right... I was adding yet another interesting number and telling people where they could learn more. The goal of this author's post is to demonstrate to people how the App Store is not Apple's profit center, but still comes from a place of surprise: as I have analyzed this many times, I hoped to drive this home for anyone (and hopefully remove any remaining surprise or question). Sadly, people seem to believe that the only motive someone could have in such a situation is to correct or call out, despite my post not ever saying the original post was wrong and talking about a different number.
Right it's the average a single app makes that matters, the heavy hitters like Rovio can make up for your dime a dozen fart apps.
A multi-billion dollar project.

I can't really imagine that. Are those ever executed by a single company all on its own? Are they software-only? Do they exist outside NASA?
No. I was pointing out yet another quite specifically different number, and pointing out a way for people interested in this to learn more on this topic.

This article is focusing on a specific number that I actually found quite hilarious (money made from the App Store being swamped by developer hardware), and is not something I have previously analyzed.